Making Friends With Slytherins, GASP!
by Ficti0nisreality
Summary: Harry and Draco are paired together in potions. They see how childish their feud is and agree to stop it. From there they become friends. DMHP slash


Harry walked into the potions lab five minutes late to class. He lurched in, out of breath and didn't even bother to give an explanation. He knew Snape wouldn't buy it.

"Mr. Potter, finally decided to grace us with your presence? Third year potions too basic for you perhaps?" Snape said silkily, with an undertone of triumph in his voice.

"Detention, Potter. In my office tonight, at eight."

"Yes sir," Harry said and began to make his way over to the empty seat next to Neville.

"No Mr. Potter, Mr. Longbottom and I are staging a little experiment. We're going to see how many cauldrons it's possible for one complete idiot to destroy in one month, without the help of a partner who can at least follow basic instructions." Snape said with a malicious smile. Harry's eyes widened for a moment. Snape had just said he could follow basic instructions. It was the most backhanded compliment he'd ever gotten, and it'd been given more to insult his friend than to praise him, but it had been a compliment in some fashion, from Snape. The world had gone mad.

"Sit with Mr. Malfoy, Potter. And try not to ruin his potion." Snape drawled.

"Yes sir," Harry said and gave Neville an apologetic look before trudging over to Malfoy's table. Harry prepared himself mentally to face the Malfoy; he forced himself to remain calm and prepared a shield of complete apathy to any insults. He sat down at the table and pulled out his ingredients.

"Potter," said Malfoy, with only a hint of bite in the words. Harry decided politeness would be the best approach; maybe Malfoy would remain civil that way.

"Hello, Malfoy" Harry said neutrally. "Since you know what's going on, why don't you just tell me what to do?" Harry asked, and then immediately regretted it. He could easily see Malfoy making trouble for him by telling him to do tedious work over or giving wrong instructions. To his surprise Malfoy looked a little relieved, and just gave him some instructions to chop up a few ingredients that didn't seem to be incorrect. Harry sighed in relief mentally. Maybe he could get through a class with Malfoy as a partner without wanting to strangle him.

As the class went by Malfoy continued to give perfect instructions in a polite tone with only a little sneer here and there when Harry asked him to repeat something.

Towards the end of the lesson Harry and Malfoy's potion was done and exactly the shade of blood red pictured in the book. Malfoy brought it up to Snape who nodded approvingly. Harry was rather proud; he had done about half the work on the potion, he and Malfoy admittedly made good brewing partners, though he'd never admit it. When he worked with Ron, if he let him help he always screwed something up and Harry had to fix it. When he worked with Malfoy, they'd both almost made mistakes, but the other had been able to stop them before anything happened. It had been awkward for Harry to tell Draco he'd only stirred clockwise twelve times, rather than thirteen, but it had saved their potion from being less than perfect and Harry was sure they had gotten an O on the brew. As Malfoy sat down they lapsed into an awkward silence, since they were no longer brewing they didn't really have much to talk about. Harry almost expected Malfoy to taunt him over something, but he seemed content to just sit and stare around the room. Harry found himself searching for things to talk about, when he realized he knew very little about Draco Malfoy. He knew he could be a snob, but he didn't know much about what he was like beyond that. Harry, feeling more awkward than ever panicked and said the first thing that came to mind, the thing he'd said a moment ago he'd never admit, "We worked well together," said Harry. He was mortified, he'd just exposed himself to attack, and he practically flinched when Malfoy turned to look at him.

"Why are you being nice to me?" he asked. Harry furrowed his brow.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

Malfoy scowled, "I mean," he said with a heavy emphasis on the second word, "why are you not acting like an idiot Gryffindor?"

Harry bristled, "Gryffindors are not idiots, and I still don't know what you mean." he said as calmly as he could, he didn't feel like fighting with Malfoy right about now, what he really wanted to do was leave the classroom and go to lunch.

"Well, Potter, whenever we speak you usually can't get one polite word out before insulting me." Draco said.

"That's not true! That's what you do!" Harry said incredulously.

Malfoy turned his nose up and said, "The last time we spoke was after charms on Friday. Weasley walked up to me and called me a 'slimy Slytherin bastard' completely unprovoked!" Malfoy said, obviously getting ready for an argument.

"Well me and Ron are not the same people, you said the first thing _I _did was insult you, and you just told me about Ron." Harry said.

Malfoy curled his lip, but looked thoughtful for a moment. "You have a point, Potter. You're _friend _is marginally ruder than you are. But the fact remains, you follow his lead almost always."

Harry scoffed, "Don't act like you don't give as good as you get Malfoy."

"Just because I am capable of retaliating, and easily trouncing you and you're friend in a battle of words doesn't mean I wish to do it every day. Weasley consistently attacks me verbally in the halls and when I am trying to relax with my friends."

Harry tilted his head and thought back to all of the times he'd been with Ron and 'defended' him from the Slytherins taunts. More than half of the incidents had been instigated by Ron and Harry had defended his friend by joining in, without realizing what they were doing.

"I suppose I never thought of it that way Malfoy." Harry conceded.

"I'll talk to Ron and see about getting him to back off, and as long as you and your group leave us alone we'll leave you alone." Harry said.

The look o Malfoy's face was pure surprise, he had expected Harry to launch into one of Ron Weasley's pathetic rants about Slytherins being inherently evil, and was honestly surprised when he'd made the offer. He spluttered for a moment, before saying, "Okay, we'll leave you alone, but only if the favor is returned." Harry nodded and stood up to leave as the bell rung.

"Bye Malfoy," he said.

"Bye Potter," Malfoy replied as he too stood to leave.

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That evening Harry, Ron and Hermione were sitting in armchairs around one of the fireplaces in Gryffindor tower. Harry and Hermione were working on Homework while Ron read a quidditch book.

"Ron," Harry said, suddenly remembering his talk with Malfoy.

"Yeah?" Ron asked.

"I was talking to Malfoy in Potions today," Harry said slowly. Hermione visibly paused in her reading to listen in and Ron's face seemed to go a tinge red.

"What did the git want?" asked Ron venemously.

"Well he was being civil, so we had a short chat about this sill feud we've had since first year. I think, and Malfoy agrees that it's a waste of time to hold silly grudges over things said two years ago. He said if we leave the Slytherins alone, they'd leave us alone." Harry explained calmly.

Despite Harry's effort at keeping Ron calm, he started to yell.

"And you think they're just going to STOP?! It's probably a Slytherin trick, they're going to give us a false sense of security and then spring! They're probably planning something!" Ron yelled.

"No Ron-" Harry began but was interrupted as Hermione put her book down and spoke very quickly.

"Ronald, don't be ridiculous! I think this has been a long time coming, it's time for you both to stop wasting time worrying about the 'evil Slytherins' and focus on your studies." Hermione took a breath and looked to Harry as if signaling for him to take a turn at lecturing Ron. Before he could say anything, he was once again interrupted by Ron giving a frustrated snarl.

"I can't believe you Hermione! You do know that everyone in Slytherin thinks people like you should be killed." Ron said like he was talking to an idiot.

Hermione gave Ron a look of disbelief and mild revulsion.

"Ron, you don't honestly believe that's what everyone in Slytherin thinks? While only about a quarter portion of the Slytherins are from purist families, I have it on good information that a good number of them don't blindly follow their parent's beliefs. In fact I spoke to a slytherin girl in the library last week from a pureblood family, and she asked me about the muggle world. She seemed fascinated, but it was obvious she had been raised thinking muggles were barbarians."

Ron scoffed, "You're both being swindled by Slytherins, they're all evil. Harry was getting a headache from Ron's bullheadedness.

"Grow up Ron," he snapped, "You need to give them a chance, I'm really tired of fighting with Malfoy all of the time. If you pick another fight with him, don't expect any help." He said sad his friend didn't see reason.

"I can't believe you two," Ron said and then stormed off.

Harry looked at Hermione, she shrugged.

"He'll come around," she said.

"I hope, I can't believe he's being so stupid though!" said Harry.

"You were actually very similar to him last year, Harry. You've matured and Ron needs to catch up."

Harry felt a little awkward talking about growing up and maturing and all of that so he just silently turned back to his charms work.

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The week went on and Ron didn't speak to Harry or Hermione once. Harry saw him yell at Malfoy once but when Malfoy looked over to him with a questioning look Harry mouthed 'He's on his own'. Malfoy had smiled and turned back to Ron to call him poor.

In the next potions lesson Ron sat with Hermione without saying a word, so Harry looked around. Malfoy was the only other person without a partner so he asked if he would partner with him.

"Okay Potter," he said.

This lesson they were brewing a potion, which required less ingredient preparation and mostly consisted of watching the potion to make sure it didn't start turning an undesirable color. As their potion boiled away Malfoy asked Harry what he knew had been coming.

"What's with you and Weasley?" he asked.

"We've had a bit of a falling out." said Harry.

"Over me?" Malfoy asked skeptically.

"Yes," said Harry. "He thinks you're plotting something and trying to get us to drop our guard. I swear sometimes Ron acts like we're the Hogwarts police, watching out for trouble and trying to get in on it. We did it in first and second year and it was incredibly stupid of us and we were nearly killed." Harry sighed and turned to read the instructions over, he didn't need to but he was embarrassed about once again exposing himself to Malfoy.

"Sounds to me like he needs to grow up," said Malfoy.

"Hermione said the same thing," Harry replied.

"I think you're right, he is such an idiot sometimes."

"Ha, you've got nothing on me Potter. Crabbe and Goyle are in a different class of idiot." Malfoy stated.

Harry chuckled,

"Why are you even friends with them?" he asked.

Draco looked slightly uncomfortable for a moment before returning to normal,

"It's a family thing. Our Fathers had us playing together since we were children, and until last year I sort of viewed them as bodyguards. Now I just want to get rid of them."

Draco turned away quickly and studied Pansy Parkinson's unremarkable shoes. Harry furrowed his brow in confusion, but then he caught a hint of red at Malfoy's cheeks. Had he just _blushed?_ Draco Malfoy! He had apparently been embarrassed that he thought of the two boys as bodyguards, it did sound pretty ridiculous to Harry but he had done stupid things in second and first year too. Charging into life and death situations headfirst without even thinking of getting a teacher had been pretty stupid after all. He decided to file the information away for later, but not to ask anything of it. After all his face still burned whenever someone brought up the chamber of secrets or asked him about the 'mysterious' events of his first year.

Snape cleared his throat and Harry instantly shifted his attention to the dour potions master.

"I will be handing out card with different potions labeled on them, your and you lab partner are too research the potion and write me a three foot essay, focusing on the ingredients interactions with each other, and how they change the potion's affects. Half the class groaned. This was going to be an extremely difficult assignment, especially so as it had to be three feet long! Malfoy picked up the card as soon as Snape put it down and read it.

"What is it?" asked Harry.

"A sleeping potion." he said plainly, "When do you want to meet?"

"How about tomorrow right after class?" Harry asked.

"Fine with me, I'll meet you then." he said. At these words Harry's stomach twitched for some reason, he ignored it and waited for the bell.

The bell rung two minutes later and Harry got up with everyone else to leave.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

That night as Harry was settling into bed he started thinking of Draco. Since when did he call him Draco in his head? He'd always been Malfoy, since first year. Maybe it was a good thing. Harry felt ridiculous every time he thought of their old first year feud. Maybe he should call him Draco, it would be truly leaving the pettiness behind. He began to think of Draco and was surprised to find he wished he could talk with Draco casually rather than out of necessity. Harry was mortified at first, before he reminded himself he was trying to stop being so petty. He figured since he was going to be working with him anyway he ought to get to know him better. Maybe they could become friends? Hermione was talking to Ron again, and it was Hard for her to try to be best friend of two people who refused to speak to each other until they conceded the other was right. Harry missed Ron, he wasn't even that mad at him. He understood Ron was being childish and needed to grow up, so he would let him do that, but until then he didn't want to be around him. He just couldn't stand Ron's constant negativity that he'd hardly noticed until Draco pointed it out to him. Harry thought of Draco again, he found his thoughts caught on the one small smile Draco had shown when Ron didn't get any help from Harry in riling up the Slytherins. Harry suddenly realized it was the only time he'd seen him smile. Harry frowned, for some reason this upset him, he wished he could see Draco smile more, and the thought of that one smile for him made him feel like he had butterflies in his stomach. Harry didn't understand why, but he suddenly really wanted Draco to smile at him again.

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Harry sat down at the table in the library across from Draco.

"Hey Potter," he said.

"err- you can call me Harry if you want." Harry said. Draco looked up at him from the book he was reading, and Harry flushed.

"Oh-err okay Harry, you have to call me Draco then." Harry nodded and then flushed in happiness and embarrassment when Draco smiled slightly at him. They started their tedious research but kept up light conversation the whole time. after three hours they had gotten most of the information they would need and just had to start writing. They decided to meet again the next day to start on writing and then went to Dinner.

At Dinner Harry didn't talk to anyone. He felt sad for some reason. He looked over to the Slytherin table and realized he wished he were over there, with Draco. He sighed and went back to his dinner.


End file.
